U.S. Jewish Leaders Warn Shamir on Orthodoxy

WASHINGTON —  American Jewish leaders, breaking their own unwritten prohibition against direct intervention in Israeli domestic politics, are warning Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir that he risks losing hundreds of millions of dollars in financial aid unless he finds a way to take back promises he made to win the support of ultra-Orthodox religious political parties.

Seymour D. Reich, president of B’nai B’rith, bluntly urged Shamir to reconsider “whether the prize he seeks is worth the price.”

Shamir won the support he needs to form a new government by pledging to enact laws restricting public activities on the Sabbath and giving Orthodox rabbis vastly increased power over public policy. In response to his promises, two ultra-Orthodox religious parties, controlling 11 seats in the Knesset, agreed to join his coalition. Their votes, plus those from other religious and right-wing parties, gave him a total of 63 seats, a bare majority in the 120-member Parliament.

A group of 27 American Jewish organizations immediately protested the arrangement, especially a provision supporting legislation to deny citizenship under the “Law of Return” to persons converted to Judaism under the Reform and Conservative strains. The law currently grants immediate citizenship to all Jewish immigrants.

Three New Jersey congressmen, none of them Jewish, said in Jerusalem on Friday that Israel was in danger of losing both political and financial support.

“We as U.S. congressmen don’t have the right to intervene in the internal politics of Israel, but the Jews of New Jersey asked us to tell Israeli leaders . . . (that) the Jewish community of the United States may show less support for Israel if internal policies are not what they should be,” Republican Rep. Jim Courter said, according to a report by Reuters news service.

Courter and fellow Republicans H. James Saxton and Dean A. Gallo repeated their message in separate meetings with Shamir and Foreign Minister Shimon Peres.

Israel receives $3 billion in military and economic aid from the United States. In addition, it receives hundreds of millions of dollars in private funds from overseas, much of it from American Jews.

Since he obtained the backing of the ultra-Orthodox parties, Shamir has sought to broaden his potential coalition by inviting Peres’ Labor Party to join as a junior partner. Peres has declined the offer.

One American Jewish leader, who asked not to be identified by name, speculated that Shamir ultimately would win enough moderate support to allow him to renege on his controversial pledges to the ultra-Orthodox.

“He may find a way to wriggle out of the most extreme agreements with the religious parties,” the leader said. “Of course, this may be a little bit of wishful thinking on my part.”

Rabbi Alexander M. Schindler of New York, president of Reform Judaism’s Union of American Hebrew Congregations, said that American Jews certainly would not abandon Israel if Shamir sticks to his deal but that “there will be a substantial alienation.”

By far the most controversial part of Shamir’s agreement with the Shas (Sephardic Torah Guardians) and Agudat Israel parties is the commitment to restrict the definition of a Jew under the Law of Return. The statute now grants citizenship to persons born to a Jewish mother or converted to Judaism. The amendment would validate conversions only if performed by an Orthodox rabbi.

Virtually all Israelis are either secular or Orthodox, but by far the largest share of the 5.5 million American Jews are either secular or aligned with the Reform or Conservative branches of the faith.

Schindler predicted that American Jews ultimately will rebel against the drive to make Orthodoxy the only legitimate Jewish religious expression in Israel.

Hyman Bookbinder, former Washington representative of the American Jewish Committee, said that opposition to the proposed law is “an issue that has united more Americans in criticism of Israeli policy than anything in the entire 40-year history of the state of Israel.”

Kempster reported from Washington and Dart from Los Angeles.